Meeting For The First Time
by speedyowl152
Summary: AU, Phil is 15 years old and lives in Manchester, after a while of waiting he finally has the chance to meet his internet best friend, 14 year old Dan.


_AN: this is legit what I did for my English narrative GCSE so if you hate it then I'm probably screwed._

43 days. I have been waiting for this for so long and it's finally happening. I can smell the rusty metal from the bridge above. There is whistling of wind through the trees. People surround me in swarms, I think they are talking but it is all silence to me. Anticipating the 'clack' of the rails an approaching train, time has never gone so slow.

Today is the day that I meet my best friend for the first time. It sounds silly, how could I know Dan if I have never met him? We met online, he stalked me on YouTube, I noticed him, we DM'd on twitter. We turn out to have a lot in common: bands, movies, books and so on.

43 days ago we planned to meet up. Today is the day. The waiting now feels longer than the 43 days before.

I am pulled from my thoughts when a train whistled around the corner. It had to be him. A sea of people poured from the train, the crowd parted as Dan was the last to leave the carriage. Hobbling along, his caramel eyes go wide as he sees me, he smiles like an excited kitten and I began running towards him.

In my opinion, Dan is the definition of cute. He has little chubby cheeks with dimples - which make his smiles even happier. He is wearing the black beanie which he is permanently wearing whenever we do video calls. A black, loose 'my chemical romance' T-shirt matches his black skinny jeans. Colourful concert bracelets stand out which go from his right wrist almost up to his elbow. He looks too handsome to be 14. I reach him and for the first time, we hug. I cannot believe that this is happening.

"Oh my gosh, Phil, you're real." He whispers into my shoulder. I chuckle in response. In real life, his face isn't as pixelated, in proper lighting he's actually a lot paler.

I hug him tighter, I never want to let go. That was a mistake given that the next sound he made was one of pain. I let go quickly and make a stream of apologies, for some reason he started laughing at me. Dan grabs my hand and drags me out of the station.

I am only 15 so my mum drove us to the Trafford centre, it took about half an hour. We had planned 'the awesomest day out in the entire history of awesome'. We walk in onto the glossy marble floor, the walls are ancient-Greek-style with pillars, a giant glass chandelier is looming above us. Dan gasps at the sight, I look over at him, he's smiling as wide as he can and his eyes sparkle with excitement.

We start our day by eating a copious amount of junk food by the water fountain. It was great and we couldn't stop talking about stuff online, his laugh is a lot more musical now than it was through a low quality laptop microphone. We actually laughed so hard that Dan went into a coughing fit, it worried me for a second and we had to look away from each other for a bit to try and calm down.

After our dinner we went to an array of shops: I bought the new Pokémon game, we went to the Disney shop and regressed about six years, Dan bought some new manga, we browsed music but didn't find anything we wanted that we didn't own already. We walked a long while around most of the shops, taking the escalator rather than the stairs because we are horrifically unfit and the luggage that Dan has been carrying around is a lot heavier than it looks despite the fact that it only contains air.

I wanted to do laser tag but decided against it when i noticed that Dan is clearly exhausted. He is red in the face and breathing slightly heavier than usual. I suppose I am also slightly tired, it is understandable seen as we don't go outside much but have been walking for hours today.

"Hey Dan," I turn to him and continue, "do you wanna sit down for a moment and get a drink?"

"Sure, as long as it's milkshakes." He looked serious and excited by the concept of milkshakes and immediately turned around to head back to a little café that we just passed.

That day went unfairly quick. I remember asking if we could meet up again in the future. He really wanted to but he's been unable to travel for a while. Since he was 11, he's had terminal lung cancer. He has to carry a green cylindrical oxygen tank around with him, there are plastic tubes which loop around his ears and join at his nose so that he can breath properly. A few days before we met up, his chemotherapy stopped working. He's been put on a new drug but as a result he cannot travel. We sent each other messages though, he said that he was doing okay but recently he has been ignoring me. The last time Dan replied to me was over two months ago, I try to contact him but it never works. I can't help but worry that maybe he can't reply, what if he never replies? What if the first time we met was also our last?


End file.
